


Sunlight

by chyanne_erin



Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), The Shifting Sands of the AhRasi
Genre: D&D, F/F, Original Characters - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-28
Updated: 2020-10-28
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:35:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27252046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chyanne_erin/pseuds/chyanne_erin
Summary: Lady Orithana Nightward has had many ideas of what love is supposed to be like. Through the stories she has read or the bard she knows, Orithana has always expected falling in love to be a certain way. Until it isn't.(Or: I got in my feelings about Orithana, her idea of love, and what that now means with Athena by her side. Whoops.)
Relationships: Orithana/Athena





	Sunlight

**Author's Note:**

> No, you named this entire fic of a Hozier song you had on repeat for days on end. Anyway, I wanted to post this before either Athena, Orithana, or both died. Just in case. So. Here we are.

There was a time when Orithana believed in love, the kind that was world-ending, that which was pulled directly from the pages of the romances she had indulged in. Like a tether in a storm, the notion of such a love kept her afloat when her mother’s shadow seemed to be pulling her into its darkness. Of course, for a lady like her, there was supposed to be no love, no amount of true love, because nobility adored their connections and the game which they all played within. Thinking of existing in such a space where she would belong to a House as nothing more than a tool to be used, to bear heirs, to create unbreakable ties and connections, made her skin itch like she was living with embers in her veins. Still, she had hoped that some Lord was going to sweep her off her feet, who enjoyed her intelligence and the way in which she preferred books over dances. All she had to do was wait. Be patient. Patience was never in her mother’s vocabulary. Things were meant to be done in an instance or not at all. Orithana tried, convincing herself that she could push off any idea of marriage, the threat of an unhappy life, if she kept running. Staying one step ahead, always trying to find that next foothold to help her into the future she so desperately wanted. Then the road ran out. She was left stranded, resigned to the life of expectations and ideas placed on her by some Lord she didn’t know. Clawing from the depths of expectations and ideas, molded into the shadows that attempted to drag her from the light which burned, not the fire which she sought, Orithana made herself found a beacon. She was trapped, until she wasn’t and, for the first time in her life, Orithana had tasted the delicacy of power, had felt it soar through her veins, made her burn brighter than she ever had before. There was no concern, then, for the possibility of some Lord waltzing into her life and taking her hand. No, he’d burn first if he dared. The night that Orithana ran away, she had hidden all notions or ideas of a love worth the ink of even telling them, convinced herself that it simply wasn’t going to happen. There had been more important things at the forefront of her mind, more important things in this world like magic, or like ensuring that she never stopped running into the open arms of the power that lingered just out of reach. 

* * *

Even when she first met him, her thought was of his title.  _ Lord.  _ It was said so casually in the tavern without a hitch to his breath, with the freedom of it becoming a statement and not a confession to be whispered, that Orithana envied him for a flash of a moment.  _ Lady _ . She had wanted to respond with the same title, wield it like he held his, but allowed it to die so pointlessly on her tongue for fear of the hunt that followed the tracks she had so carelessly placed. Orithana began to fall for him in the town that held their namesake but told herself such foolish things, idiotic at the end of the day when ravens still followed, were pointless. Besides, surely he would never look at her that way, surely he’d never grab her hand and tell her just how much she meant to him. Surely. Yes, there had been a time where she had envisioned a happy ending with him. Golden hair, striking blue eyes, all of the warmth that she could ever want. Dreams wither, change, get all muddled with the realities of the world that they dare not exist in. Sometimes the boy with the pretty eyes, that draws you in with his fancy words and the amount of fire that burns inside of him, isn’t what you need. Orithana had enough fire of her own, enough rage and pain that all the fissures that bled them out into the world didn’t need encouragement, an extra spark, no. They needed a gentle hand to temper it all, to make her see the world for what it was going to be and not the things she conjured in her head. She, though, wanted the intensity and excitement that arrived from the potential of the boy in front of her. 

And then, well, he left in only partial fault of his own and she convinced herself that there was going to be more time to figure things out, to finally beat the Ravenstars at whatever game they were playing, and to be free from whatever threats that breathed down their necks. She believed, much as she had before, that she had time. Sometimes pages get lost along the way, smudged ink gets stuck behind the storyteller’s teeth, coats their throat and makes it difficult to get the words out. These ones came through clear, evident, simple.  _ Married _ . There was a time when Orithana had believed in spending her life with him by her side. She thought, foolishly and hopelessly romantically, that if she waited a bit longer, begged the gods for more time, a path so clear and beautiful would carve itself out before them and clear the way for their love. It was historical, was it not? Did the world not owe her at least a chance at happiness? It wasn’t the fault of the world, though, that closed the chapter or ended on it on such an abrupt note. No. It was his. It was his, so she arranged the meeting with the eldest Ravenstar and told herself that, perhaps, she’d buy herself more time and, in those days, she’d temper all of her hope about love once more. He came back, though, and all thoughts of the sadness, of calming the fire between them, faded away like waves back into the ocean, forgotten until the next storm came. Surely, he promised that there was no romance and, surely, Orithana wanted to believe him but the letters, the gold, the need to check in on whatever was happening back home, it began to chip away at what she believed. One thought loomed above it all in some unknown fact — he was charming, she could love him one day and, when that day came, where would Orithana be? She loved him. Ladies were supposed to love Lords. Orithana chased the feeling of having such parallel lives end so poetically, of what a beautiful tale they were telling, that life was gifting them, that she dared not think about  _ her _ . Orithana did, though, because there was a woman waiting for her husband to return and he held onto Orithana’s hand too tight. There had been a time where she accepted the fate of returning home, of leaving him, of this belief that she had been given one single chance at getting that sort of love and she had lost it forever. She had been tied to the Ravenstars and he wore the seemingly unbreakable strings of the Duilas. Still, there was some part of her that pushed for the story they were meant to share. Alfred told them all, laid out their adventures so simplistically and beautifully across the entire continent that, of course, one day he would tell theirs. The story of how they fell in love. It would be beautiful. It would be poetry. She convinced herself so deeply of this that, one day, if they had enough time, the tale of their love would be carried through the ages and she’d never have to wonder about it again. 

* * *

He told her that three months was forever, and that she needed to only hold on for a moment longer. She was tired, wanting desperately to let go of all the foolish ideas she never gave a name to but he assured her it'd all be worth it in the end. Standing in the home of the house he married into, the illusion of added protection from whatever the eldest Ravenstar had been planning, Orithana was warned of one thing — to stop wearing her emotions so plainly in the jaws of such a city as Vir. Advised by the rogue, nonetheless, who seemed to not only watch Orithana’s back but who wished to protect her from whatever dangers laid in the court and the contract between the Duilas and her bard. Orithana was told that hearts on sleeves were only good when not in danger. She had tried so hard to hide that part of herself, to add indifference to her words to the House which had trapped him in the first place with a snare of supposed alliances and promises. Then, well, it just so happened that the youngest Ravenstar, the boy she was to marry, despised her as much as she despised him. Furthermore, it seemed, he had a relationship just as complicated with his father as she had to her mother, and he told the single key that didn’t end in death of either kind to get her out of their agreement. Grasping onto the only escape left for her, Orithana and her party managed to set her finally free from the threat of a life not worth living. She could breathe again. She could love, and she did. In the shadows of her family home, surrounded by the flowers and the moonlight, she said the words that had haunted her since she met him, that had been waiting to be unleashed upon the world, and she, for once, wasn’t terrified. 

* * *

And then, he left again. Abandoning his love, repeated words as the only comforts in his absence. Orithana felt more hollow and angry than she ever had before, burying it deep into whatever recesses of her mind she could find to keep pushing forward because there was a world that needed her. On the beach, where she had begun to fall so effortlessly and, perhaps, foolishly for him, she had taken a handful of sand as they waited. All the grains fell between the gaps of her fingers, warm but fleeting. When he held her hands, dragged that chalk against the wood of the ship deck, and he stepped into the circle to escape back home, Orithana couldn’t help but feel every moment with him was much the same. Grasping onto the seconds that were there and left empty when he was gone. Not a way in which to live. Not a way in which to love. Orithana thought that, perhaps, it’d be best if she became the daughter her family needed anyway. All possibilities of loving or being loved could be tucked away neatly, away from the threat of the light. She envisioned telling her mother one fateful night to begin pulling the strings she so liked to orchestrate, yet she hesitated. Not for him, no. There was something like fate, the gods, or whatever thing in this world could be considered merciful,that made her pause long enough to begin to feel the spark of a second chance. 

Athena was both the anchor and the lighthouse. She was the solid presence needed to keep her grounded and that which brought her back home. Through the fog of weak deception, of assurances that she was fine, Orithana told herself that no one was going to witness what lay buried, but she did. There is a difference between being witnessed and truly seen. Orithana felt seen when, tentative and assured, Athena told her of the anger and sadness which bloomed in her chest after the departure of Alfred, the abandonment of her patron, and the threat against her sister. Athena had told Orithana to allow the fissures to heal, to pour out all of her emotions so that Athena could catch them. She was so easy to talk to. She was so easy to trust. Orithana was too scared then to say the things that she had been thinking, the pain that had arisen from the breaking of her pact and Alfred’s actions because words had power. Speaking those feelings would only give them the fuel needed to burn her so, she said thank you instead because, at least, if she got tired of running she’d have a safe place to rest. When Athena grasped at her hand in the jungle, the rain pouring down around them, Orithana never felt more at peace in her life. Steady, calm. A pause. A single moment of peace and clarity. It was enough for the time. Enough for her to feel like life could hold all the potential of love, of goodness, inside of it once more. 

There was the tent. Her hand against Orithana’s cheek. The story of what it was like to have loved and to nearly die by it pouring out of whatever dirt Athena had buried it under. A softness, the likes which Orithana had never experienced before, washed over her. Although the storm raged on outside, Orithana had never felt more safe in her life. Her chest ached for the girl that Athena had been before the pain, and she longed for a life in which Athena had never experienced such horrific things. No one should have to wield a blade against their heart. 

“You’re so easy to love,” Athena had said at the end of it all. A revelation. A promise. Whatever it was, Orithana felt the weight on her shoulders lessen. She had never felt easy to love before. She had been raised by a mother who made her feel as if love was something to earn, not to be freely given out. Easy to love. Orithana knew what it felt like to fall through the air with no footholds or place to land. This didn’t feel like that. Then, life gifted her a reality check, placed in the form of her sister who stared at her like some sort of monster, the words she wielded dripping poison and hatred. Blind panic was all Orithana felt. A pure, steadying anxiousness that had ignited every part of her mind and made her feel as if she’d never breathe again. Her sister was in direct danger. Her sister aligned herself with  _ him  _ because Orithana had failed. Orithana had been selfish and had thought only of herself. She had focused solely on Alfred’s leaving and the rising feelings between her and the rogue. Selfish is what it was. Irresponsible too. It was Athena whose arms she ran into, though. Athena who caught her. 

Weeks later, in the temple of a god neither of them worshipped, after facing a beast of myth and legend, after Orithana finally found salvation, there was the confession. 

“I love you,” she had said and that first love felt so different when not stated through scribbled ink left as a goodbye. It was stated like a promise, like there was so much more beyond the surface that Orithana would need to dig to find all the meanings of the three words said to her. Orithana asked her to stay anyway, even though there was nearly no doubt that the only thing that could separate them anymore was death and, even then, Orithana was certain that such a threat wouldn’t stand against them. Of course, Orithana melted into her. She’d have been foolish not to. Sun and smoke intermingled. There was still Alfred to think about but Orithana didn’t want him. She wanted her, in that moment, more than anything. Her who had always been there from the start. Her who had brought her to the present instead of the panic of the future. Her who had remained steady by Orithana’s side. Her who had loved so deeply and intensely, who burned so quietly, who watched over Orithana despite her eyes being turned elsewhere. It was her. But she asked herself, what about him? The echoing words he had said to her in both letter and voice — stay safe, stay alive. Orithana kissed her anyway and told herself she’d have more time.

* * *

Relief was the first thing Orithana felt when he rushed up to her as he took her into his arms. Panic was the second. The third was that he looked so damaged it nearly broke her heart. The list of things she wanted to say, wished to discuss with him, or think over together, evaporated from the surface of her tongue and left her with nothing but silence in its wake. How could she say every horrible thing carved out of the pain she had felt to him now? He was no longer the boy that had left her on that ship. Somehow, three months became much too long and the string that she had tied so neatly around him, had told herself she was never going to break, slackened with the tug of their lives in roads that seemed were never going to converge. He promised her that he would reunite with her one day but the future felt so far away, so ultimately uncertain before the threat of the archfiend which held the tethers around her sister. Words meant nothing. They were hollow. It was actions which spoke in the life they led. When death was always so close to their heels, breathing down their necks, hunting them down across continents and time, it was actions that proved everything. Orithana let him walk away because of this, even though she wished to beg him to stay. How many times had she had such a thought? To wish for him to stay? How long had she been wordlessly saying it, praying he would stop drifting so far away? Orithana pretended to understand the responsibilities of his House while his hand slipped out of hers, warm and fleeting as he went to dream of their future. She dared not to say goodbye because, then, what else would all come tumbling out? She’d let him have his escape from the world and saved all those empty words for another day. 

* * *

Orithana had never felt more terror in her life. All other instances paled in comparison. Seeing Zariel stand next to him, scared for whatever was about to happen, left Orithana feeling as if she had never experienced a worse moment. In the midst of the battle, staring down her ex-patron in all the arrogant air he held, the tauntings he spoke, Athena turned to her. 

“Do you trust me?” she had asked. The question, answered without thought, began laying out the direct path which Orithana could see take shape in front of her. Perhaps they were facing down the end of the world, with it exploding in a fiery blaze like  _ he  _ would want, and no amount of wishful thinking could protect them, but she saw it. For a brief, glimmering glance, through all the terror which she had grown so accustomed to, the new shreds of it she had found, Orithana felt as if she was basking in the sun. All thoughts of the ice and the snow which surrounded them, all threats of a life filled with nothing but winter, evaporated in the single word that solidified her fate.

“Completely,” Orithana said, the word conveying more than she could ever say, begging for Athena to dig deeper and find the branches that led to the things Orithana felt. Of course she trusted Athena. It needed no extra thought. No questioning. There had never been a moment where Orithana doubted her. There was no other ending.

* * *

Sitting on the precipice of their involvement with a civil war, Orithana had grabbed her hand and talked of revolution. Before them there seemed to only be two options — align with the people and risk losing their friends or fight for the nobility that they both despised. The worst outcome, though, was to separate them altogether. 

“I totally understand if you wish to stay with him for this but if he chooses their side, I can’t be here,” Athena said and Orithana knew how much it must have hurt her to say that. To give Orithana the option to leave when she so desperately wanted her to stay. 

“I won’t lose you. I can’t. If everyone in there decides to be with the nobles, we can lead this revolution ourselves,” Orithana said among a city that bore nothing but destruction and pain, but she chose her. 

“If he walked out, right now, would you be with him?” Orithana looked away, out towards the horizon where no such questions existed, but she gave an answer anyway, suggesting that if the path was clear that their lives would’ve been so different. 

“No, right now, all of the sudden if he walked out and was free, would you?” The weight of the question hung in the air between the two and, although tears came to her eyes and made it difficult to answer Orithana said, “No, I don’t think so.” That is when Orithana realized, fully, that maybe their story wasn’t meant to be told in the way she believed it was originally going to be. Not poetry, not historical, just a story of sadness with a quiet ending. The conclusion had been waiting, silently, for her to arrive at it in her own time. It was like Orithana had read through every page but refused to witness the final words that could alter all the ideas that brewed in her mind. They were over. He’d need to know. She still loved him, convinced herself that maybe, another time, another life. Surely there was some part of her that still loved him so completely, yes. Along the way, though, it had changed into something that was a different shape than it had been at the start. 

* * *

It had happened, Orithana thought as she was left with the rising sun, not in the way she had expected but slowly. That feeling, spark, whatever it was. There was a difference between falling and whatever they had done. It was like, one day, Orithana had awoken with this notion in her heart, mind, or soul and had thought, “Was it meant to be any other way?” Of course Orithana loved her. There was no doubt about it, no wondering or questioning. When Athena held her hand there was no fear that she would slip away, just out of reach. She would always be there, no matter the hour or the chaos that surrounded them. If she lost her, Orithana didn’t want to think what hell she’d bring onto the world. Orithana wouldn’t have it any other way. She wouldn’t dare to let her go. A future, a future which Orithana had never seen, a future filled with happiness and light, had followed with Athena at every step. It had waited, oh so patiently, to be seen by Orithana and, when she did, there was no looking back. There had been a time when she believed that everyone got their single chance at love, that more fire was better than the calm, but Orithana now knew that both of those supposed facts weren’t true. She had loved before and loved even now, deeper and more intensely than she ever had. 

“I see a future with you,” she said in a voice that faltered because, if Orithana was being honest, she never saw a future before. When thinking that far ahead all she saw was darkness and, now, there was a light. It was as if she had been living under the stars for her entire life, never to see what the day could hold when, suddenly, the sun rose and showed her an entire world that had been waiting for her. Seeing the rogue sit beside her on that step, her hand so solid inside of Orithana’s, the warlock made a deal with herself. She would love, then, fully, and eternally. Maybe not forever, but for whatever they had left, she would be by her side, she would protect her, and she would never leave her. Orithana swore that she would love her. Completely. She loved her, in a way that Orithana had never loved before, had never believed she  _ could  _ love like this before. Staring at her, Orithana knew that, if it came down to it, she would end the world for Athena, and Athena would end it for her but, for now, it was enough to rest in the sun. 


End file.
